Monday November 5th, 2007 The Red Church

Today I attended the Red Church and took some photographs. It is a landmark here in centrum Bialystok. The white church in the photograph is the original church. In the time of the czar the Russians had control over this area of Poland and the Orthodox Church being the favored church of the Russians received preferential treatment by the authorities. The Catholic church requested permission to build a new church as the white church was too small and cramped for the growing congregation. This request was turned down by the Russian authorities. Sometime after the denial of the request to build a new church, the Catholic church requested, this time, permission to build an addition to the white church to ease congestion. This request was granted by the Czar and the Red Church that can be seen almost anywhere in Bialystok is the addition that was built to the white Church. I am told that this “addition” was completed in record time.